With Senator Barack Obama looking increasingly confident about winning the Democratic nomination, there have been a new spate of articles on what it would mean for Pakistan if he becomes president.

The most eye-catching, perhaps, was a story in The News  about how President Pervez Musharraf's family in the United States have been giving donations to Obama's campaign.  "President Pervez Musharraf's family members here are supporting and giving donations to a US presidential candidate who strongly opposes the Bush administration policy of supporting and keeping the retired general in the presidency," it says.

The Daily Times, in an analysis by former Pakistani foreign secretary Najmuddin A Shaikh, says there would be little difference between Obama and the Bush administration on the need to hunt out al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan -- if needs be through unilateral U.S. action -- and on keeping its nuclear weapons safe. What the writer sees is a difference in tone,  which would be welcomed in Pakistan:

"What one can expect, however, is that Obama will be less averse - as the candidate for change - to recognising that extremism in the Muslim world flows from causes other than religious injunctions, no matter how this may be portrayed by so-called spokesmen for Islam or misguided scholars in the West," he says. "He certainly will not be talking about crusades nor will he oppose direct talks with adversaries."

But what strikes me is how this optimism about Obama may be offset by the United States in general taking a harder line against Pakistan, regardless of who wins the presidential elections.  A couple of months ago,  in a blog on Obama's policies on Pakistan, I wrote about how he supports unilateral strikes on al Qaeda targets in the country.

Since then, the background noise in the United States about the need to attack al Qaeda and the Taliban inside Pakistan has increased --  to the point where you wonder whether any difference in style and substance Obama might bring would be drowned out by a hardening shift in public opinion towards taking a more aggressive stance.

One blog I came across, calling itself the Danger Room on Wired.com, argues that Pakistan is in fact al Qaeda's best base for planning attacks on the United States and Europe, since unlike more unstable places like Iraq where the United States is free to use force, the group flourishes in countries where there is a reasonable amount of state control.

"Pakistan's better infrastructure, weak counterterrorism capacity, ambivalent counterterrorism policy, and increasingly prickly sovereignty issues gives al Qaeda a more stable platform to train, shield and export personnel-everything a terrorist group needs to organize an attack against targets in the West, as a string of plots now seem to show," it says.

There are arguments against this -- the most obvious being that al Qaeda developed first of all in the chaos of Afghanistan -- but it's worth reading to see where the tide of public opinion might be headed.
 
 

LAS VEGAS - Rapid response is taking on new meaning in the 2008 presidential campaign.
    
Less than 24 hours after Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama mentioned how his uncle helped liberate the Auschwitz concentration camp during World War Two, Republicans were all over him — since it was the Soviets rather than the Americans who freed the camp.
    
The Obama camp owned up to the mistake, saying the Illinois senator meant to refer to Buchenwald, not Auschwitz.
 
The move by Obama to try to bring up military service came after likely Republican presidential rival John McCain blasted Obama for his lack of military service as the two candidates sparred over legislation to increase education benefits for veterans. Obama supports the measure and McCain does not.
    
At a Memorial Day event with veterans in New Mexico on Monday, Obama said he could not “know what it is to walk into battle” because he had not served in the military.
    
But he told of his grandfather’s service in World War Two and an uncle “who was part of the first American troops to go into Auschwitz and liberate the concentration camps.”
    
The Republican National Committee fired off an e-mail calling that a “dubious claim” and pointing out that it was the Soviets, not the Americans, who liberated Auschwitz.
    
“So unless his uncle was serving in the Red Army, there’s no way Obama’s statement yesterday can be true,” said Republican National Committee spokesman Alex Conant.
    
The Obama campaign quickly put out a clarification. 

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

-Photo credit: Reuters/Steve Marcus (Obama standing before the U.S. flag)

LAS VEGAS - Barack Obama went to Las Vegas this week but skipped the fun for which the city is known - gambling at its casinos.
    
The Democratic front-runner for president stopped in the Nevada gambling haven as part of a tour of Western states seen as battlegrounds in the November election.
    
Campaigning on a promise to help those hit by the subprime mortgage crisis, the senator from Illinois visited the home of a couple who talked of their fear of foreclosure. They mentioned their work at the ornate Bellagio hotel and casino.
    
“It’s a wonderful hotel,” Obama told them. “The only problem with me is when I come to Las Vegas, I’m not allowed to have fun.”
    
Pointing to the camera crews crowded around the family’s kitchen table, Obama said, “Everybody knows me. If I start playing blackjack, I’ll get in trouble.”
    
Obama’s schedule might have allowed a little bit of time at a card table. He arrived in Las Vegas early Monday evening ahead of his campaign events the next day.
    
But, unlike some of the reporters in his entourage, he chose to hit the gym instead of the casino.
    
Obama apparently is a skilled card player.
    
As a state senator in Illinois, Obama participated with other legislators in a weekly poker game, according to David Mendell, who has written a biography of him.
    
“He played carefully and was adept at not revealing his hand,” Mendell wrote in his book, “Obama from Promise to Power.”

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

-Photo credit: Reuters/Steve Marcus (Obama with supporters in Nevada)

PHOENIX - As President George W. Bush helped fill Republican presidential hopeful John McCain’s campaign coffers this week, the Democrats wasted no time cutting a new video arguing that the Arizona senator would just be an extension of the Bush administration’s policies on issues like the Iraq war and taxes. 

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino tried to offer some distance between Bush and McCain when talking about the president’s efforts to help candidates during the 2008 campaign.

“Any candidate who’s running for office has to stand on their own two feet and they have to chart a course for themselves.,” she told reporters aboard Air Force One.

“Every election is about change — go back through history and every single one is about how things are going to look in the future,” she said. ”And that’s what Senator McCain has set out to do, which is to chart his own course, talk about how he will lead this nation in a time of war and threats from enemies and the challenges we have of keeping competitive in the world as the economy is in a current slowdown.”

Not surprisingly, the Democrats have a little different take on that, which they put together in a video montage that will no doubt serve as the primary message they plan to serve up through November. Here it is:

While Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain argue who would be the better president, once-overwhelming White House favorite Hillary Clinton is trying to convince voters she’s still relevant.
 
It’s a tough sell.
 
She began airing a 60-second radio ad on Tuesday in South Dakota, which, along with Montana, will hold the final two Democratic nominating contests next week.
 
While Obama holds a seemingly insurmountable lead in the all-important delegate count, underdog Clinton makes the case that it isn’t over til its over.
 
In the radio spot the announcer says: “In Washington, some people say the presidential primary in South Dakota doesn’t much matter. That your voice doesn’t really count.”
 
“But you know what?”
 
“Tuesday, we can show ‘em.”
 
“We can pick a President.
 
“After all, just because South Dakota comes last in the primaries doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be heard loud and clear.
 
“And we can pick the candidate who’ll stand up for us.
Hillary Clinton.”
 
Clinton is spending the next few days campaigning in Montana and South Dakota, and then will return to the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico which holds its Democratic primary on Sunday.
 
Clinton faces a major showdown on Saturday when Democratic Party officials meet to decide what to do with disputed delegates from Florida and Michigan.
 
The two states, which were stripped of their convention delegates for violating party primary rules, are believed to be making plans to allow at least some delegates to be counted. 

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

-Photo credit: Reuters/Ana Martinez (Bill and Hillary Clinton)
  

DENVER - Republican John McCain tried Tuesday to convince voters a McCain presidency would not amount to four more years of President George W. Bush, but he ran smack into hecklers bent on tying him to Bush’s unpopular war in Iraq.

“America must be a good citizen of the world, leading the way to address the danger of global warming and preserve our environment, strengthening existing international institutions and helping to build new ones,” McCain told an audience at the University of Denver.
 
The Arizona senator had barely uttered those words, charting a course away from Bush, when he was interrupted by hecklers chanting “Endless War! Endless War!”

The hecklers were shouted down by a larger crowd chanting “John McCain! John McCain!”
 
McCain no sooner started his speech again — announcing he would seek to reduce global nuclear stockpiles — when he was interrupted once more by anti-war protesters.
 
“What about Iraq? What about Iraq?” one shouted. Another unfurled a banner that said, “Iraq vets against the war.”
 
When the larger crowd shouted down the protesters again, McCain quipped, “This may turn into a longer speech than you had anticipated.”
 
“And by the way, I will never surrender in Iraq, my friends. I will never surrender in Iraq,” he added emphatically to applause and laughter. “Our American troops will come home with victory and with honor.”

McCain, 71, also took the opportunity to emphasize youth.
 
“For much of our history, the world considered the United States a young country. Today, we are the world’s oldest constitutional democracy, yet we remain a young nation. We still possess the attributes of youth — spirit, energy, vitality, and creativity. America will always be young as long as we are looking forward, and leading, to a better world,” he said.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

 Photo credit: Reuters/Rick Wilking (Top: McCain at Denver rally; bottom: protesters unfurl banner)

LAS CRUCES, N.M. - Democrats will eventually unite once the hard-fought presidential nomination battle between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton is resolved but that process may take time, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said on Monday. 

“There’s going to be a need for healing,” Richardson, a former White House hopeful who is backing Obama. 

Richardson, who had served as energy secretary and ambassador to the United Nations in former President Bill Clinton’s administration, remained on the fence for several weeks before deciding to support Obama, an Illinois senator, two months ago.

After announcing his decision, he talked of a tense phone call with Hillary Clinton when he broke the news to her. James Carville, a longtime adviser to Bill Clinton, called Richardson a “Judas.” 

Obama, who now holds a lead in delegates over Clinton that probably is insurmountable, was on the campaign trail with Richardson on Monday. The governor introduced the Illinois senator at a Memorial Day veterans forum in Las Cruces, New Mexico. 

Richardson, who is of Latino descent, is expected to provide a boost to Obama’s efforts to court Hispanic voters. 

Campaigning in Puerto Rico last weekend, Obama sprinkled some Spanish phrases into his speech. Richardson said the senator’s Spanish is “passable” but the effort is appreciated by these voters. 

Although Latinos gravitated toward Clinton in many primary races, Richardson said Obama can boost his support by increasing his visibility with the community. 

Listing some of the messages that will help Obama, Richardson said, “He talks about respect. He’s a minority himself” and comes from a family of modest means.

- Photo credit: Reuters/Edwin Montilva (New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, shown during an April 2008 trip to Venezuela.)

ALBUQUERQUE, NM - Republican John McCain aired a stirring television spot on Memorial Day honoring the role of Latino servicemen and women — his latest salvo in a campaign to woo back Hispanic voters who deserted to the Democrats.
 
“My friends, I want you, the next time you’re down in Washington, D.C., to go to the Vietnam War Memorial and look at the names engraved in black granite. You’ll find a whole lot of Hispanic names,” McCain intoned over a montage of clips showing monuments to fallen service men and women.
 
“When you go to Iraq or Afghanistan today, you’re going to see a whole lot of people who are of Hispanic background.”
 
U.S. Hispanics support for the Republican Party, small but growing steadily over the past decade, has ebbed in the past year, following a bruising battle over illegal immigration.
 
Republican lawmakers last June sank a comprehensive immigration bill — co-sponsored by McCain — that would have created a path to citizenship for many of the 12 million mostly Hispanic undocumented immigrants in the United States.
    
A report by the Pew Hispanic Center in December, before McCain emerged as the Republican front-runner, found that just 23 percent of Hispanic registered voters called themselves Republicans — 5 percentage points fewer than in 2006.
 
Both McCain and Democrat rival Senator Barack Obama made campaign stops on Monday in New Mexico, one of several swing states with significant Latino populations that may prove key in the November election.

In an apparent attempt to soothe Republicans still angered by his support for comprehensive immigration reform, McCain also used the television spot to stress the key role played by immigrants with legal U.S. residency.
 
“You’re even going to meet some of the few thousand that are still Green Card holders who are not even citizens of this country, who love this country so much that they’re willing to risk their lives in its service in order to accelerate their path to citizenship and enjoy the bountiful, blessed nation,” he said. 

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

-Photo credit: Reuters/Richard Clement (Republican presidential candidate John McCain)

BAYAMON, Puerto Rico - U.S. presidential candidates don’t often make it to Puerto Rico, so the language barrier is not usually a problem.

It was on Saturday, though, for Democratic front-runner Barack Obama, who visited the largely Spanish-speaking U.S. territory ahead of its nominating contest on June 1.

“We have translators because my Spanish is just so-so,” he told veterans, who discussed in both languages their concerns about health care facilities on the island.

Still, Obama did give a shot at a few non-English phrases.

“Your vote is decisive,” he said in Spanish at the end of his remarks in English.

“Together we can change the world.”

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.

Photo: Reuters/Ana Martinez - Barack Obama shakes hands during a campaign event in Bayamon, Puerto Rico on May 24.

WASHINGTON - Former U.S. Sen Bob Dole is a leading advocate for war veterans and a longtime Republican ally of presidential candidate John McCain, but on Friday he sided with Democrat Barack Obama to endorse a bill the Arizona senator opposes to raise benefits for former soldiers.

The legislation passed by the Senate on Thursday is at the heart of a fierce spat between McCain and his Obama, the Illinois senator closing in on the Democratic presidential nomination. Obama questioned McCain’s commitment to veterans, while the Republican candidate blasted the Obama’s lack of military service.

“I’m for the concept … I probably would have voted for it, if we get the money,” Dole told the National Press Club in an appearance spiced liberally with his trademark political wit. He acknowledged, “I haven’t read it, which is not a requirement in Congress.”

The bill would increase education benefits for war veterans. Dole likened the current political battle to the one over the narrowly approved post-World War Two G.I. Bill, which generously funded college education and other benefits for soldiers and became wildly popular.

“I’m for it. That’s how I got an education,” said Dole, who was severely wounded in the war.

McCain said the Senate bill would encourage too many soldiers to leave the military after one term.

Dole’s appearance came ahead of the Memorial Day weekend honoring U.S war dead. He gave a progress report on veterans health care, saying it was improving under recommendations of a panel he helped lead following revelations of shabby facilities at the Army’s Walter Reed hospital.

But in a question-and-answer session Dole also offered views on this year’s presidential race, from the perspective of an 84-year-old elder statesman who lost to Bill Clinton in the 1996 presidential campaign and to Walter Mondale in the 1976 vice-presidential race.

Dole addressed issues including:

– Republican electoral chances, which he said were hurt by the Iraq war and weak economy: “It’s a tough year for elephants (Republicans).”

– McCain’s rejection of a conservative pastor’s endorsement, after controversies over derogatory statements about Jews and Catholics: He characterized his own decision to reject a donation from a gay-and-lesbian Republican group in the 1996 campaign as “stupid.”

  
“My view should have been … what Ronald Reagan’s view was. If they agree with my policies and want to support me, that’s fine.”

– McCain’s health report, released on Friday:  “If age is an issue, I’ll serve with him.”

Dole would have been 73 had he won in 1996 at age 73. McCain turns 72 in August and would be the oldest person elected to a first term as president.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.
 

Photo credit: Reuters/Jim Young (Bob Dole, right, with President George W. Bush and former Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala at a meeting on veterans’ health care in March 2007)